Search Continues After Tajik Quake

Published 8:00 pm, Wednesday, January 9, 2002

Associated Press Writer

An earthquake killed three children and left 600 people homeless in Tajikistan, and rescuers were searching through rubble on Thursday for other possible victims.

The earthquake hit the mountains about 150 miles northeast of the capital, Dushanbe, on Wednesday and had a magnitude of 6 to 7, officials said. The most damage was reported in Rogun, 60 miles northeast of the city.

The quake destroyed 204 houses, four school buildings, four small hospitals and four power transformers, said Abdurakhmon Radzhabov, first deputy in the Emergency Situations Ministry.

The three killed were all children from the same family, girls ages 3 and 6 and an infant boy less than a year old.

Of 54 others injured by the earthquake, six people remained in critical condition, Radzhabov said.

Hundreds of people who lost their homes were living in tent camps.

One of Central Asia's largest hydroelectric power stations is under construction in Rogun. The facility was undamaged by the quake, having been built with the region's seismic activity in mind, emergency officials told ITAR-Tass news agency.

Russian television showed medical personnel and quake victims trying to pull clothing, rugs and other possessions from their shattered homes. Tajik and international aid agencies on Thursday sent flour, cooking oil, sugar, tents, blankets, warm clothes and medicines to the region, the ITAR-Tass news agency reported.

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Some Russian aid supplies passing through Tajikistan bound for neighboring Afghanistan will be diverted to help those affected by the quake, Russian Deputy Emergencies Minister Yuri Brazhnikov told the Interfax-Military News Agency. Russia has also offered to send rescue teams to the site, he said.